Seattle Motorcycle Show 2011

Another show, another weekend and another year has come and gone. While many mark the year end with all that holiday fuss, I much prefer to note it with much less stressful events like meeting fellow bloggers in Seattle for the weekend and taking in a motorcycle show.

This is our third consecutive year attending the show and every year it is in someway just a little bit different, each year we try a new hotel and of course new restaurants. Not everyone can always make it to the show every year so I'll give all of you much more notice next year.

We drove up Friday afternoon and arrived early enough to wander around town and find some dinner before Bobskoot and Mrs. Skoot arrived. Bob was anxious to go down to Pike Place Market and snap some night photos before they shut off the lights. We played around down there for an hour or more until they kicked us out by threatening to call the police on us.

This couple came out of the restaurant and into my shot, I don't think they saw me standing there but it made a great photo.

Bob on the other hand, you have to be quick to catch him.

Saturday morning it was rise and shine, bright and early to get down to the lobby for the continental breakfast and to beat the crowd. We had our fill and chatted with Bob and Yvonne before heading down to the motorcycle show.
 

 We met up with SonjaM and Roland as well as Orin, another blogger difficult to catch on camera.

The venue this year was at the Washington State Convention Center in downtown Seattle which made it very convenient to find somewhere to eat, sneak in a little shopping, see the sights and for its close proximity to our hotels. It has been held at Qwest Field the past few years which is a bit out of the way and a bit of a walk if you want to do anything after the show. The Convention Center in my opinion is a much better location as the show was set up in different rooms which spread the crowd a bit and reduced the noise opposed to the one big stadium. Tully's Coffee was in the house to provide sustenance and restrooms were plentiful.  

Moving to the show and the motorcycles.

 Aurora Suzuki dealer was present with the redesigned 2012 V-Strom 650.

Triumph was there with the bike I most wanted to see, the Tiger Explorer 1200.

It isn't as big as I expected nor as heavy but at 539 lbs. wet it took some heft to get her off the side stand. It is so similar in size to Lucy that it would make a great tourer across country but I'd be reluctant to take it too far off the beaten path. Although the Explorer has shaft drive, ride by wire and traction control I still much prefer the Tiger 800.

2012 Triumph Street Triple in Imperial Purple

Tiger 800... Bob says he's already on the darkside but could be easily persuaded darker.

 Even Harley fans are "Tri-curious", wait is he an H-D rep?

A BMW dealer was there with a couple of bikes and the BMW R 1200 R. and WOW is that a nice bike. I may have to change my 7 bikes for 7 days choices, unfortunately I couldn't get a picture.


Kawasaki had a large presence as well as Honda, Star/Yamaha, Ducati, Victory, Can-Am and Harley Davidson whether as manufacturers or dealers. Not to mention the vendors that braved the "poor economy" to show up and those poor scantily clad models who couldn't afford full skirts and had holes in their stockings yet always offer a smile.

I had to laugh as the young lady was teaching kids how to paint bikes. I told one guy to hide the paint cans in his garage or he'd come home to a freshly "look daddy" painted bike. 

 My babysitter never looked like that!

 Needless to say we all had a great time at the show and it was off to lunch with the moto-bloggers.



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